To Hunt or be Hunted
by aeonianCruor
Summary: Bored with the end of Sburb, Karkat goes into the universe he and his friends created. There, he will fight monsters- however, he will also have to convince the Winchesters that he is not one himself.
1. Another Universe

**A/N: This is pretty much my first story, so sorry if it isn't the best. Obviously, I own neither Homestuck nor Supernatural. Anyways, I hope you enjoy it!**

* * *

To create a universe is no easy matter- nor is it possible for any existing creatures to survive the brutal trials of Sburb, save for a select few. Therefore, it was no small feat when a brave group of trolls and humans were able to successfully bring up their new universe after sweeps of destruction. Though this group planned to foster a universe of trolls, the matriorb conjured up could still never be perfected even when it seemed functional on the outside. Because of this, the new universe was populated with humans; however, that was far from the only species to inhabit it.

The time is 10:41, and John Winchester has just breathed his final breath. The atmosphere is heavy, fraught with Sam and Dean's mourning over the sacrifice made to keep the latter alive. These brothers are all too familiar with the supernatural, and now monsters have taken yet another thing from them.

"I CAN'T WATCH THIS." Karkat's voice, despite its commonly upraised volume, was spoken as a mutter before he got up from his computer. His brown-maroon god tier cape swished at his feet; though his original quest bed and sacrificial slab were long since destroyed alongside his original world, the denizens in the game allowed him and all the others that were not formerly at such a level to ascend upon the creation of a successful universe. Karkat closed the lid on his laptop, hiding the viewport he had previously been watching. He knew that he had all his friends where he was, outside of that universe. However, every time Karkat watched the hunters of that world, he was fascinated to see them struggle with the creatures that seemed to come from the human world's "religion". Perhaps because of god tier status, or possibly because the people in the new universe were just created so they couldn't, Karkat and the other Sburb players were able to see the true forms of all these creatures wandering around in the absence of dream bubbles. Apparently that universe had some other places that ghosts could go after death, strangely categorized so that the afterlife experience would vary depending on how people acted during life. This concept seemed rather absurd to Karkat, only increasing his interest in it.

Having grown rather fond of the Winchester brothers in particular, Karkat could no longer suppress his desire to go down to that universe and join the fun. However, he had already asked Jade to take him there twice before, only to be reminded that the creatures of that universe had never seen and would freak out at the sight of a troll. Karkat reluctantly went back to watching through the viewport each time before, but now struck with inspiration, he reopened his laptop.

carcinoGeneticist (CG) began trolling gallowsCalibrator (GC)

CG: HEY TEREZI.

GC: SUP :]

CG: SO SINCE YOU'RE THE SEER OF FUCKING MIND AND ALL, DO YOU KNOW IF THERE'S A WAY TO MAKE PEOPLE'S MINDS SEE ME DIFFERENTLY? LIKE, FOR EXAMPLE, AS HUMAN?

GC: WHY WOULD YOU W4NT TO LOOK HUM4N?

CG: JUST ANSWER THE FUCKING QUESTION.

GC: OH R1GHT B3C4USE YOU W4NT TO GO TO TH3 N3W UNIV3RS3

GC: YE4H 1 TH1NK TH3R3 M1GHT B3 4 W4Y

CG: WELL THEN WHAT THE FUCK IS IT?

GC: 1 GU3SS 1'LL M4K3 SOM3TH1NG TH4T W1LL M4K3 YOU LOOK HUM4N TO TH3 P3OPL3 1N TH4T UN1V3RS3

GC: BUT 4T 4 COST :]

CG: FINE, WHAT THE FUCK IS IT?

GC: F4LL 4SL33P 4ND T4LK TO YOUR 4NC3STOR W1TH TH3 R3D SW34T3R

CG: WHAT?!

CG: UGH, FINE.

CG: THOUGH I DON'T KNOW WHY THE FUCK YOU GET YOUR KICKS OUT OF SEEING ME TORTURED LIKE THIS.

GC: H4V3 FUN :]

gallowsCalibrator (GC) ceased trolling carcinoGeneticist (CG)

CG: FUCK

carcinoGeneticist (CG) ceased trolling gallowsCalibrator (GC)

Groaning heavily, Karkat made his way over to his recuperacoon. Surely Terezi was laughing her ass off right now at the idea of his suffering. He just hoped she would hold up her end of the bargain. Even as he was internally slamming his head into a wall repeatedly as he heard Kankri's lecture, Karkat couldn't help feeling excited to go join the Winchester brothers as a hunter.

* * *

"OKAY, I LISTENED TO HIM UNTIL MY GOGDAMNED EARS WERE FALLING OFF, NOW ARE YOU DONE?" Karkat was nearly tripping over his own feet as he rushed over to where Terezi was reconstructing Can Town, his clumsiness much to her amusement.

"Y3S, 4CTU4LLY." Terezi looked somewhat proud as she handed Karkat a necklace bearing a turquoise amulet engraved with the mind symbol.

"WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS?" Karkat felt somewhat let down, expecting her to cast a ridiculous spell or some such sh*nanigans. (You immediately feel a bit vile for thinking the explicative.)

"JUST PUT 1T ON." No longer protesting, Karkat carefully clasped the pendant behind his neck.

"I DON'T FEEL DIFFERENT." Just before Karkat could proceed to direct a long-winded stream of curses at Terezi, she spun him around so he caught sight of the mirror behind him. Karkat's jaw dropped as far as it could without being ripped out and tossed to the ground. He was caught in a stunned silence at the sight of his reflection, simultaneously repulsing and thrilling him.

"Hey, have you seen the Mayor aro-" As he rounded the corner, John dropped an armful of cans, which would then proceed to roll around on the floor as he stared at the figure in front of him. It had human skin, blunt colorless nails, regular human teeth, typical white eyes with green irises, chestnut-colored hair, and not a nubby horn to be seen- and yet, this person was undeniably Karkat.

"Karkat?!" John was rendered just as speechless as Karkat, and Terezi merely smirked in response.

"1 GU3SS 1T WORK3D TH3N." Karkat responded by weakly nodding and muttering "yup"; he was even less shouty, despite the volume of his speech not being an inherently trollian trait. After several more moments of his stunned stupor, Karkat dashed off to meet Jade. He could finally be a hunter. He could finally meet the Winchesters.

* * *

After a similar reaction from the Witch of Space, Karkat was finally sent to Earth, having stopped only to gather his non-pajama clothes along with some human currency and at least five computers (like any sensible person should) in his fetch modus. He appeared in a dark alleyway devoid of security cameras, greatly startling a cat that was previously scavenging through an old cardboard box. Karkat wasted no time in heading to Harvelle's Roadhouse, which was conveniently quite nearby.

Sitting down cautiously on a worn leather stool, Karkat asked the young woman at the bar if he could talk to Ellen. Though Karkat had not looked much into the future of the Winchesters' timelines past this point, he knew that they would arrive here soon and the woman here could help a fair bit with hunting. He was warily escorted to a back room by the bartender Jo, where he saw a woman holding a rifle close to her side.

"Who are you and why do you want to see me?" Ellen eyed Karkat with suspicion- he appeared nothing like a hunter nor anyone she knew. He responded in a voice much more typical in volume than he was used to, careful about how to introduce himself.

"My name is Kyle Vales." One of the many things he learned from watching the Winchesters was that one should never give away their true name to someone they do not trust. Besides that, his appropriately alien-sounding name would raise unwanted suspicion from this woman ready to shoot him at a moment's notice, and he wasn't in the mood to explain why a chest full of bullets wouldn't kill him.

"Kyle, eh? Now get to the point and tell me what you want." The response that formed in Karkat's head was enough to make him gag, sounding awfully like a childish kid wanting to be a hero, but he got the words out nevertheless.

"Could you help- er- would you have any advice for anyone wanting to become a hunter?" Karkat cursed under his breath; the phrase was just as cringeworthy as it sounded in his head, perhaps even more so. Ellen sighed, leaning back into her chair.

"Listen, kid. I don't hunt much- I just know a lot of people that do. I don't know how you heard about this lifestyle, or what's happened in your life, but someone like you just isn't cut out for it." Karkat was fuming with suppressed anger at Ellen's words; despite him being eleven sweeps old (the rough equivalent of 24 human years) and painstakingly short, it was definitely not this woman's place to patronize the man who happened to be one of the creators of her universe. Regardless, he maintained the unfamiliar guise of politeness, knowing nobody on this planet should learn of his identity.

"Listen, you can judge me all the fuck you want, I could just use some damn pointers." Ellen became slightly less tense, still not knowing why she was agreeing to help him. Karkat was silently grateful that she did not suspect the blood magic being worked on her, though the detection of such was probably impossible anyways.

"All right," Ellen sighed. "You ever done any fighting before?" Karkat pulled out an iron sickle from his sylladex, realizing too late that this was probably a bad idea as this universe had no such thing. Upon seeing him pull the weapon out of what seemed like thin air, Ellen immediately pointed her gun at Karkat's face, standing up and ready to shoot him. Karkat recaptchalogued the sickle, slowly putting his hands up.

"What was that?" The words Ellen spoke sounded more like a command than a question.

"Fuck. Uhh… okay, don't shoot me. I can explain." The gun remained firmly in place, Ellen clearly demanding answers first. "Okay, so… I… can store things, in a way, and take them out when I need to use them." His answer was met with confusion but not with any less rifle in front of his face, so he continued.

"I just… it's an ability." Ellen seemed to relax a bit, though still extremely wary. She had concluded that Karkat was a psychic, making her only slightly less suspicious of him.

"Okay then, Kyle… How do you kill a skinwalker?" Karkat knew much about hunting already from watching the Winchesters- perhaps even more than they did. He was mostly just here because he knew it was where the Winchesters would come next. However, his rather extensive knowledge of hunting did not help with Ellen's suspicions, as he said he was not a hunter.

"Perhaps I should not say so much that I need training to become a hunter… rather, I would like someone to work with."

"You know that most hunters are lone wolves, right? Nobody really hunts together unless they're close with each other." However, Karkat did not respond, instead using his blood powers to silently persuade her to agree to help. Thankfully for him, control over relationships and bonds was more versatile and less boring than one might suspect.

It was the very next day when Sam and Dean Winchester came by, being greeted with similar suspicion to that directed at Karkat, who was currently watching from his unnoticed position across the room. Ellen and Jo seemed to calm down much more quickly upon hearing their identities, as their father was an acquaintance to Ellen. Karkat decided to just listen until the brothers were done talking with the other man there, then subtly prompted Ellen to introduce him.

"Oh, and, uh… By the way, Kyle over here might also be able to help you find that demon. I'm not sure how much time he's spent in the field, but he seems to know an awful lot about hunting." Sam and Dean eyed Karkat with suspicion, analyzing him much as Ellen had. However, they knew they could use as much help as they could get, and as Karkat had made use of a lot recently, blood powers never hurt.

"Well then, Kyle, nice to meet you." Dean shook Karkat's hand, slightly unnerved by Karkat's piercing gaze. "I guess you can hunt with us, but make sure you never do any harm to the Impala."

"Don't worry, I'll be fucking amazing to your car."

Sam walked over to Dean and Karkat, neither of whom had noticed him leave. He held a folder in his hand.

"Check this out. A few murders, not far from here, that Ellen caught wind of. Looks to me like there might be a hunt."

"Yeah, so?," Dean responded.

"So, I told her we'd check it out."

"Well then," Karkat added, "what the fuck are we waiting for?"

* * *

They went over the case in the car, and at the mention of clowns, Karkat quietly muttered "gogdammit, like I haven't dealt with enough of those bucket-fillers." Dean and Sam began teasing each other about their fears, Sam's being clowns and Dean's being planes, before Karkat aggressively cleared his throat and they promptly changed the subject.

They arrived at the local circus- the clown ghost supposedly killing children's parents seemed to be bound to this circus, so that was naturally their first place to look for the cause of it. The brothers mostly ignored Karkat, who was agitated by his own unfamiliar silence.

"You know, looking for a cursed object, it's like trying to find a needle in a stack of needles. It could be anything," Sam said. Dean responded, "well, it's bound to give off EMF, so we just have to scan everything."

"Isn't that fucking great. It's not like anyone will notice us going around waving a damn scanner everywhere like a bunch of lunatics." Karkat's customary anger was palpable in his speech, to which Dean replied that they would have to find a way to fit in.

Dean and Sam were quite often good enough liars, but Karkat was astonished by how poorly they were trying to convince the circus owner, Mr. Cooper, that they had acted in the circus before.

"You see that picture?" Mr Cooper gestured to an old photograph of a man in front of an amusement park ride. "That's my Daddy."

"You look an awful fucking lot like him," remarked Karkat. Indeed, the man in the picture looked like Mr. Cooper- perhaps too much so.

"He was in the business- ran a freak show 'till they outlawed them in most places. Apparently displaying the deformed isn't dignified. So, most of the performers went from honest work to rotting in hospitals and asylums. That's progress, I guess." Karkat shuddered to imagine Gamzee honking insanely within a cell, singlehandedly strangling the staff members while covered in his own violet blood. This case reminded him far too much of the honking maniac.

Mr. Cooper insisted that the three hunters were too normal for circus work, that they should live average lives and go to school. This elicited a slight smirk from Karkat, which everyone else in the room respectfully ignored.

"Sir… we don't want to go to school." If Karkat were in another situation, he might have facepalmed: the refute was weak and did not leave a particularly good impression. Sighing quietly, Karkat mentally reached out to Mr. Cooper, urging him to cooperate. It worked, though Karkat knew very well that there was no need for it to.

As soon as they were out of the carnival, Karkat pulled Sam and Dean hurriedly into an alleyway, his strength surprising both the Winchesters because of his lean build and meager height.

"Dude, what the hell?" Dean's protesting was silenced as Karkat covered his mouth.

"Listen. That man… is not a person." Karkat practically spat out each word.

"What?" Sam looked at Karkat with a sense of bewilderment. "How do you know?"

"Think about it. That picture he claimed to be his dad was definitely him. Ever heard of a fucking rakshasa?" Both Dean and Sam looked slightly confused. They had not; after all, Karkat knew more about monsters through his investigation of almost every hunter to have existed up to that point than the Winchesters could have learned through their own lifetimes.

"They're creatures that eat humans and can turn invisible. Plus, they have to be invited to enter homes, which fits perfectly with the way this gogdamn clown is killing. Aside from that, they only eat a few times every twenty, thirty years or so. You mentioned that the same case occurred with this circus a while back, and this fucker was at both carnivals." Both the Winchesters looked stunned, but neither moved to deny what Karkat said.

"Wait, so you just saw this picture and figured that this is what and who we're dealing with?" Sam's voice was tinged with disbelief, and rightfully so; after all, Karkat could see the creature's true form as soon as he laid his eyes on it, but he knew better than to tell anyone this. Karkat made a mental note to be more careful to hide everything about him that these humans would deem abnormal.

"Well then," said Dean, his voice reluctant, "how do we gank it?"

"Pure brass." Karkat's response was followed by the closest thing to an actual smile that anyone had seen since he entered this universe, showing the teeth that Terezi had so adequately disguised the fang-like shape of.

"Well," Sam chimed in, "before we go stabbing things into Cooper, we're gonna want to make damn sure it's him."

"These fucktards sleep on top of dead insects, so if you want to go looking for a bed of those little shits, be my guest." Karkat followed that with, in a lower tone, "but trust me, I know what I'm doing."

"Then I guess it's time to go kill that son of a bitch." Dean decided to go along with Karkat's plan, a decision that was admittedly caused in part by Karkat himself.

* * *

They decided to enter the funhouse in order to fight the creature, as it contained a set of pipe organs quite clearly made of brass. Sure, the Winchesters were taking quite a risk surmising that, but Karkat did not bring up the issue.

Sam and Dean made their way cautiously through the funhouse, wary of the invisible monster that might be anywhere around them. Karkat behaved similarly, following his resolution to hide his ability to see the monster. They made their way towards the pipes, ready to break one off, when Karkat spotted the rakshasa, poised to throw a knife straight at Sam's heart. Running forwards, Karkat moved so that his own shoulder blocked the knife's destination, feeling the sharp sting of the blade less than a second later. Dean and Sam's heads both whirred towards Karkat, thankfully assuming that the blade was headed for him in the first place.

"It's here!" Dean's shout was followed by a whirring sound as a blade was thrown past him and hit the wall behind. Sam finished breaking off a brass pipe from the organ and swung it at the air in hopes of making contact with its flesh.

"Swing closer to the doorway! That's where the knives are coming from!" Karkat's shout, nearing his usual manner of speaking, was enough for Sam to hit and kill the monster.

The rakshasa fell dead to the ground, but the Winchesters' attention wasn't on it long before turning to Karkat, who was losing blood at an impressive rate. He ripped out the blade and covered the wound with this hand, insisting that he was okay. He rushed off rather quickly to bandage the wound before Sam and Dean could say anything.

* * *

turntechGodhead (TG) began pestering carcinoGeneticist (CG)

TG: dude i was watching what you were up to down there and thats an awful lot of blood

TG: and its undeniably heroic so be careful

CG: YEAH, IT'S UNDER CONTROL.

TG: so hows that new universe?

CG: ASIDE FROM BEING SUPERBLY FUCKED UP IN EVERY WAY?

CG: IT'S ALL RIGHT.

TG: ok man

TG: but you could see that monster right

CG: OBVIOUSLY.  
TG: then why didnt you just kill it

CG: BECAUSE WE CAN'T LET THE PEOPLE IN THIS UNIVERSE KNOW ABOUT US, REMEMBER FUCKASS?

TG: oh right

TG: anyways have fun with your demon hunting buddies

CG: I WILL.

turntechGodhead (TG) ceased pestering carcinoGeneticist (CG)

Karkat was now back at Harvelle's Roadhouse with Sam and Dean, talking to the man named Ash, whom they had earlier requested to put together some information to find the demon that killed John Winchester. Ash showed them with a program that would track all signs of the demon, reminding Karkat of Sollux in its technical expertize.

Karkat watched quietly as Dean and Sam talked about the memory of their father. Karkat never really understood these familial relations, but he knew well enough not to bug them about it. He knew it would only hurt them more if he told them why their father really died. As Karkat watched Sam walking away from Dean, he was caught by surprise to see Dean bashing the nearby cars with a club. Karkat ran over to Dean, hurriedly trying to calm him down, something that Karkat was particularly good at. As Karkat patted Dean reassuringly, he heard a weak voice from the man he was calming.

"Kyle… This doesn't concern you…" Regardless of his pent-up anger about his father's demise, Dean couldn't bring himself to lash out any more. He walked away without saying another word.

* * *

 **A/N: Feel free to leave a review telling me what you want to see from this story (though you might want to keep in mind that I'm a bit new to this, so don't go too hard on me ^^'). I will be updating the story based on reader interest and as soon as I get more chapters written, which should be fairly quickly, assuming I have reason to. Thanks for reading, and have a good day!**


	2. The Blood of a Troll

**A/N: New chapter! *Scattered applause* ...Okay. Anyways, I still don't own Homestuck or Supernatural. I probably wouldn't be writing fanfiction if I did. Yup.**

* * *

Karkat felt somewhat uncomfortable in the pale blue shirt and white coat of his disguise as a doctor, walking into a sterile room behind Sam and Dean. There had been reports of cattle mutilations and of two people being beheaded in the area, so Dean decided to check it out with unnerving enthusiasm. After quickly sending away the other doctor in the office, they proceeded to cross the room, pulling out a panel to reveal the corpse of a victim that was beheaded. A plastic box lay at the end with the head inside.

"All right. Open it." Dean's instruction was returned by Sam, insisting, "you open it."

"I'm not going to stand around all day while you fuckasses argue like wigglers." At this point, Dean and Sam had both accepted that Karkat's vulgarity sometimes took an interesting form. Karkat lifted the lid of the box, revealing the head within.

"Maybe we should, uh, look in her mouth, see if this wacko stuffed anything down her throat." Looking pointedly at his brother as if to prove his own bravery, Sam pried the corpse's jaws open.

"Dean, get me a bucket." Upon hearing Sam's request, Karkat froze and his eyes widened.

"WHAT?!" Karkat's voice sounded as loud as it had without Terezi's charm, and he quickly tried to regain his composure and quiet himself down.

"What, are you afraid of buckets of something?" Dean directed the question in a manner torn between humor and confusion, and Karkat slightly flinched at the word. _I am mature_ , he reminded himself. _I helped create this entire universe, and I can deal with an inappropriate reference._ He regained his posture, clenching his jaw tight.

"I was just asking because this is repulsive. Sorry." Saying this, Sam backed away slightly and turned back to the severed head, pretending nothing had happened. He began prying open the mouth when Karkat told him to lift the upper lip. Groaning, Sam did so, revealing a small hole in the beheaded corpse's gums. Sam pressed his hand gently above the hole, causing a fang to push out.

"Vampire fangs. Well, that changes everything," Dean remarked as he let out a sigh.

* * *

Sam, Dean, and Karkat walked up to the bartender at a local bar, the Winchesters both requesting beers while Karkat did not dare to try anything. Dean slid the bartender a fifty dollar bill, asking if he had seen some people around- up all night, party owls, the basic vampire profile. Karkat watched almost regretfully as Dean slid the bill across the table; Karkat knew he could ensure the bartender's cooperation easily without wasting money, but he didn't want to risk bringing up any suspicion. Taking his eyes off the money, Karkat took to looking nowhere in particular when something caught his attention. In the corner of his vision, which was admittedly much better than that of humans as he and other trolls were raised in the darkness of Alternian nights, he spotted a man eyeing him and the Winchesters with suspicion.

"We're being watched," Karkat whispered to Sam as quietly and inconspicuously as he could. Sam nodded slightly, returning his attention to Dean's conversation with the bartender. "Thanks," Dean finished, leading Sam and Karkat to the door. Both were careful not to avert their eyes to anywhere that might draw suspicion. As they exited the bar, before Dean could say anything, Sam quietly relayed Karkat's message. The three continued until they rounded a sharp corner, then drawing out their weapons as they hid behind the turn. Karkat drew out a gun from the holster the Winchesters had given him; he avoided storing the weapon in his sylladex, knowing that having even one person on earth know of the inventory system was far too much already.

The man Karkat had noticed watching them earlier rounded the corner, quickly pinned against the wall by Sam and Dean. Karkat held his gun up but did not make a move to trap the man, knowing already that he was not a vampire. Unaware of this, Dean demanded to see the man's teeth. The man protested, demanding that he was not a vampire, a fact that he quickly confirmed. From a brief interrogation that Karkat stayed out of, it was revealed that this man hunted vampires. Sam and Dean relaxed their hold on the man, who announced himself to be named Gordon Walker.

"Now, who the hell are you?" Gordon asked the question, visibly relieved to not longer have a knife and two guns in front of his face.

"Sam and Dean Winchester, and this is Kyle Vales." Dean's answer was met with understandable recognition at the first two names, and simply a slight puzzlement as he saw the last was a short man with a slight build. Sam and Dean continued to converse with Gordon, who boasted of his ongoing hunt and seemed rather keen to get the other hunters out of there. Karkat eyed Gordon closely, scrutinizing him, giving off a glare that unnerved Gordon even as he saw the eyes as those of a human. Karkat recognized Gordon, having watched him through the viewport before, and tried to remember what it was about this particular vampire hunter that had seemed wrong.

It took little convincing for Karkat to get Sam and Dean to join him in following Gordon from a distance. The brothers were not ready to leave this case unfinished, so they did not question Karkat's motives in trailing behind Gordon at a safe distance. Sam and Dean, lacking Karkat's troll vision, squinted as the three of them watched Gordon sneak up to a worn old house. A vampire walked out of the house, lured out just before Gordon smacked him on the head.

"Uh oh," Karkat murmured, seeing that Gordon and the vampire were now fighting. He and the Winchesters ran towards the location of the fight, arriving just in time for Dean to pull Gordon out from under a descending and conveniently-located chainsaw. The vampire's head turned to face Karkat, eyes filled with an expression Karkat could not analyze. Dean then pinned the vampire down and finished lowering said chainsaw, resulting in an audible crunching of bones as Dean struggled to keep the saw down while it cut off the vampire's head. Karkat mentally made a note that chainsaws were much more difficult to fight with than Kanaya made it seem.

Karkat had the other hunters drop him off at the hotel as they headed down to a bar, opening his laptop as soon as he got to the room.

carcinoGeneticist (CG) began trolling grimAuxiliatrix (GA)

CG: KANAYA.

GA: What Is It

CG: THIS MIGHT SOUND ODD, BUT SINCE YOU'RE A RAINBOW DRINKER, ARE YOU ABLE TO SMELL OTHER PEOPLE'S BLOOD?

GA: Yes Actually And Might I Implore As To Why You Are Asking

CG: I WAS BY ONE OF THESE FUCKING NEW-UNIVERSE CREATURES THAT ARE LIKE RAINBOW DRINKERS WHEN IT FUCKING TURNED TOWARD ME. IT SEEMED AS IF IT KNEW SOMETHING., AND I KNOW FOR A FACT THAT THOSE FUCKERS CAN SMELL BLOOD.

GA: But Didnt Terezi Make A Thing So That You Seem Human To Every Person And Thing That Sees You

CG: SHE DID, BUT I THINK SHE MIGHT NOT HAVE DONE ANYTHING TO ADJUST HOW THE BLOOD IS PERCEIVED. AFTER ALL, THESE ASSHOLES BLEED THE SAME COLOR AS I DO.

GA: Yes That Might Present A Problem Because Human Blood Does Smell Quite Different From Troll Blood Even When It Is The Same Color

CG. FUCK. I GUESS I'LL HAVE TO ASK TEREZI TO CHANGE THAT AS SOON AS I CAN.

GA: I Doubt She Will Make The Adjustment Without Making You Subject Yourself To Another Extensive Speech From Your Dancestor

CG: THAT FUCKING… WELL, THANKS KANAYA.

GA: Should I Tell Terezi To Expect Your Presence In The Quite Near Future

CG: NO, BECAUSE THESE FUCKING NEXT-UNIVERSE HUMANS WILL START ASKING QUESTIONS IF I'M GONE FOR TOO LONG WITHOUT AN EXPLANATION.

CG: AFTER I DEAL WITH THESE LITTLE BLOODSUCKING SHITS, HOWEVER, TELL HER I WOULD GLADLY SHOW UP RIGHT ON KANKRI'S FUCKING DOORSTEP.

GA: I Am Not Completely Decided On Whether I Should Take Offense To Your Description Of Those That Drink The Blood Of Others

CG: THINK WHATEVER THE FUCK YOU WANT. FOR THE RECORD, THOUGH, I HAD NO INTENT TO INSULT YOUR... CONDITION.

GA: Wonderful

GA: I Will Be Expecting Your Presence Once You Are Finished With Your Present Occupation

GA: You Did Leave In Quite A Hurry As Soon As Terezi Gave You That Charm

CG: ALL RIGHT, I'LL HAVE AS SICKENINGLY LONG-WINDED A GOODBYE AS YOU WISH WHEN I GET TEREZI TO DISGUISE THIS FUCKING BLOOD.

GA: I Look Forward To It

carcinoGeneticist (CG) ceased trolling grimAuxiliatrix (GA)

Karkat shut the lid of his laptop, leaning back in his chair. Sam walked into the room just as Karkat had started to get comfortable, causing Karkat to sit up.

"Oh. Hey, Kyle." Sam spoke in a defeated tone, doing little to disguise his low mood. Karkat returned the greeting with a slight wave. Putting down his soda, Sam walked out of the room not long after he entered, presumably just wanting to be alone. However, this would not be the case, as Karkat heard struggling and fighting sounds from outside the room seconds later.

"Fuck," Karkat muttered, running out to see Sam trying to fight off a pack of vampires. Karkat dashed quickly behind Sam to block an incoming blow to the back of his head, causing Karkat himself to crumple under the force of the attack.

* * *

Inside a dream bubble that was clearly not his own, Karkat opened his eyes slowly. He turned to his left, examining the surrounding that appeared to be the interior of a hive he had not seen before. Near him sat a troll with two sets of horns and sweeping hair that covered his eyes. _Sollux's dancestor_ , Karkat thought, looking at the troll that appeared too absorbed in his skateboarding video game to notice the intruder.

"UH… HI." At Karkat's greeting, Mituna spinned around, bolting up to his feet.

"WH0 4R3 Y0U? W417, N3V3RM1ND. Y0U LOOK L1K3 K4NKR1… H15 D4NC3ST0R R1GH7"

"NO SHIT, FUCKASS." Hearing Karkat's remark, Mituna frowned slightly, muttering out a timid apology.

"F0R Y0UR 1NF0RM4710N, 7H3 N4M35 M17UN4 N07 'FUCK455'"

"WHATEVER." Karkat was about to leave the bubble before he turned around, remembering that he should probably wake up after those fucking vampires knocked him out.

"BY THE WAY… COULD YOU HIT ME REALLY HARD OR SOMETHING? I REALLY NEED TO WAKE UP." Mituna only responded by flipping Karkat off. Sighing, Karkat grabbed a nearby vase and bashed it into his head as hard as he could.

* * *

Karkat woke up to feel his hands and feet tied up with a coarse rope. Though he had no doubt in his mind that Sam had also been captured, the only other person in the room was a female vampire that stood watching Karkat.

"Oh good, you're awake." The vampire walked up to Karkat, looking at him with fascination in her eyes.

"Normally we would have left you alone, but you are quite the special case." Karkat resisted the urge to roll his eyes, severely regretting not going to Terezi as soon as he suspected that his disguise did not account for the smell of his blood.

"Let me fucking guess," Karkat offered, "my blood doesn't smell like anyone else's you've ever known?"

"Precisely." The vampire leaned in, her face inches away from Karkat's. Her next words were barely audible.

"I know better than to mess with unknown creatures, and believe me, I don't intend to harm anyone- not even humans. But, with that said… What are you?" She looked somewhat fearfully into Karkat's eyes, though he knew she was not lying. Karkat decided to ignore the question.

"Fair enough. I won't hunt you down, and I'll do my best to make sure none of the other hunters with me do either. However, you have to promise me one thing… You and your friends must not tell anybody about me, or I swear I will fucking gut you while each gogdamn fiber of your being screams for mercy. Understood?" The vampire agreed to his terms, clearly not one to look for trouble. Karkat was reluctant to leave his identity up to a promise, but a quick use of his blood powers guaranteed that the vampire would stick with her word. Karkat waited for her to untie him, knowing that taking something out of his sylladex would cause too much of a scene on top of the trouble that had already been created. With all his limbs released, Karkat stood up and walked behind the vampire into a separate room where another vampire looked ready to eat Sam.

"Wait. Step back, Eli." The female vampire's tone was one of slight reproach. The male vampire backed off, retracting his fangs.

"My name's Lenore. I'm not going to hurt you. We just need to talk." Lenore tore off the gag over Sam's mouth, watching as he heaved in relief.

"Talk? Yeah, okay. But I might have a tough time paying attention to much besides Eli's teeth." Sam practically spat the words out, glaring at the male vampire.

"He won't hurt you either, you have my word," Lenore said with great patience.

"My word? Oh, yeah, great, thanks. Listen, lady, no offense, but you're not the first vampire I've met." Sam spoke the words shortly before Karkat emerged from behind Lenore, adding, "she's telling the truth."

"Kyle?" Sam looked at Karkat with some confusion as he walked over to untie Sam's bonds. Lenore tried making a move to stop him, but halted as Karkat gave her a meaningful look.

"We don't kill humans, and we don't drink their blood. And, as I'm sure you've noticed, we've let your friend go and are allowing him to free you similarly." Fumbling at the knots, Karkat resisted the urge to smirk at the word "allow", aware that doing such would not help matters in any way.

"Okay, uh, correct me if I'm wrong here, but shouldn't you be starving to death?"As Sam spoke, Karkat moved on to the rope at his feet, tugging at the coarse material.

"We found other ways- cattle blood. It's not ideal, in fact, it's disgusting, but it allows us to stay out of trouble. No reason for people like you to come looking for people like us." As the finally-freed Sam made a move to stand up, Lenore quickly grabbed his wrist to stop him from escaping. Under normal circumstances, Sam would have used this opportunity to fight back, but he was momentarily frozen by the words of this supposedly pacifistic vampire. Eli stepped up and shoved black bags over Karkat and Sam's heads, gripping their wrists behind their backs as he led them into a van.

"One last thing," Lenore said as Sam and Karkat were being dragged out. "We're leaving this town tonight. Don't come looking for us, and tell your hunter buddies not to either." With that, the two hunters were pushed into the vehicle, their hands tied once again.

* * *

Sam had a look of uncertainty as he walked into the hotel room where Dean and Gordon were sitting, Karkat following him.

"Where have you been?" Dean spoke the question with his back turned. He looked up at Sam, who responded, asking, "can I talk to you alone?" Dean agreed and the two left the room.

Karkat sat down where Dean had previously been, eyeing Gordon with skepticism. Neither of the two had been particularly fond of the other, and it was at that moment that Karkat remembered why.

"I know you fucking killed your sister." As Karkat finished speaking the words, Gordon leaned back, laughing. Gordon affixed a stare to Karkat, speaking intensely as he said, "and I'm proud of it." While Karkat could never fully understand human families, he knew that this act was particularly reprehensible in human culture. Karkat let out a low growl, but quickly tried to compose himself. It would be one thing to reveal his alien identity to an ally or a powerful entity, but this man would spread the word and stir up trouble. Thankfully, Gordon did not seem to notice.

Gordon stood up and walked towards the room's back exit. Karkat opened his laptop and switched over to the viewport, watching as Gordon spied on Sam and Dean's conversation. He quickly turned it off again as the two walked into the room.

"Gordon?," Dean called out as he walked into the room.

"He just left. I think…" Karkat paused. "...I think he's going looking for the nest. We have to stop that asshole." _Specifically,_ I _have to stop him_ , Karkat thought. There was no chance he would do anything to break his promise with the vampires. Sam, Dean, and Karkat jumped into the Impala, taking off for where Sam remembered the nest to be.

As soon as they arrived, Karkat bolted out of the car, dashing into the room where Gordon was carving into Lenore's skin using a knife coated in dead man's blood. Karkat ran up to Gordon, pinning him to the wall by his neck. Karkat held Gordon's knife up to the neck of its former user, ready to slash his neck any moment.

"Wait, Kyle, don't kill him yet!" Dean called out to Karkat, who very reluctantly loosened his grip, though still held Gordon very firmly in place.

"Don't you make a fucking move." The words were spoken through Karkat's gritted teeth, and for a moment, Gordon could have sworn the teeth appeared pointed. Karkat finally let go of Gordon, who was too shocked to move for a few seconds as Karkat untied Lenore's bonds and lifted her to her feet with Sam's assistance. However, after regaining his composure, Gordon gripped his knife once again and lunged at Karkat, cutting through his disguised skin. As Karkat's blood started dripping onto Lenore, her fangs bursted out, temporarily consumed with hunger for this foreign substance.

"See that?" Gordon's voice was cold, but that did not fail to betray a slight waver in his tone out of fear. "They're all the same- evil, bloodthirsty. You should be helping me! She deserves to die like all the others!"

"No." Lenore's voice was shaky as she attempted to regain her composure. "No." She would prove she was better than that.

"You hear that, Gordon?" Sam was steady as he asked the question. "We're done here."

Karkat lifted Lenore up, carrying her out of the room. He laid her down gently, making sure not to hurt her any more.

"You promised… Not to let them hunt me down…" Lenore's voice was weak.

"And this is me, following up on the promise. You remember your side of the bargain, right?" Lenore nodded slowly in response to Karkat's question. Thanking her, Karkat got up and walked back into the room where he left Sam and Dean. Inside, Gordon was tied up and the two brothers stood over him.

"Aren't you going to kill this fuckass?" Even as Karkat spoke, he knew neither of the Winchesters would do that, respecting their human ideals of pacifism even towards this man. Karkat sighed.

"Did Lenore and the others get out okay?" Karkat nodded in response to Sam's question.

"Here's what we're gonna do," Dean said as he leaned towards Gordon. "We'll call someone in two or three days, have them come out and untie you. Until then, get comfy." Dean kicked over the chair with Gordon in it, pushing him down to the ground. Sam, Dean, and Karkat walked away, leaving the tied-up man behind them.

* * *

Karkat had told Sam and Dean that he needed to go do something, and would meet back up with them soon. After exchanging a few hushed words, they agreed. Making sure nobody was in the area to witness his disappearance, Karkat messaged Jade.

carcinoGeneticist (CG) began trolling gardenGnostic (GG)

CG: HEY, JADE.

GG: hi karkat!

GG: let me guess, you want to come back to our universe?

CG: GREAT FUCKING JOB, YOU GUESSED RIGHT.

GG: okay see you soon! :)

carcinoGeneticist (CG) ceased trolling gardenGnostic (GG)

Seconds later, Karkat found himself in front of Jade. He unclasped his mind charm and captchalogued it. Sure, his human appearance was interesting and necessary in the new universe, but he still sighed in relief to be back to his old self.

"hows it been down there so far?" Jade was as enthusiastic as she always was when not being mind-controlled or faced with a horribly grim situation, and her dog ears perked up a bit at the sight of her nubby-horned friend.

"FUCKING GREAT, NOT CONSIDERING ALL THE BULLSHIT I HAVE TO GO THROUGH TO LOOK LIKE A GOGDAMN HUMAN TO EVERY FUCKING CREATURE THERE."

"well im sure its not that bad!" Jade smiled. Sure, she would have to hide her god tier status and dog ears in that universe, but regardless, Karkat could not help thinking it would be much easier for her as (mostly) a human.

"IF YOU FUCKING SAY SO. ANYWAYS, DO YOU KNOW WHERE TEREZI IS?" Jade slightly giggled when she heard Karkat mention the troll almost everybody assumed to be his caliginous crush. Dismissing the notion with a well-placed middle finger, Karkat glared at Jade as if to say _just answer the fucking question_. Understanding the gesture, Jade told Karkat that Terezi was in can town. _Just as always,_ Karkat thought. He did not know why he had even bothered to ask.

"1S TH4T CH3RR13S 1 SM3LL?" Walking into the room, Karkat directed his gaze over to the teal-blooded troll. Terezi took note that Karkat was not wearing his human disguise, then asked why he was there. Karkat tossed her the mind necklace.

"IN CASE YOU DIDN'T NOTICE WITH YOUR STELLAR SENSE OF SMELL, THERE ARE CREATURES IN THAT UNIVERSE LIKE RAINBOW DRINKERS THAT CAN SMELL FUCKING BLOOD. AND, IN CASE YOU ALSO DON'T REMEMBER, MY BLOOD STILL DOESN'T SMELL LIKE THAT OF A FUCKING HUMAN."

"TH3N WH4T'S TH4T? YOU W4NT M3 TO F1X 1T? YOU KNOW FULL W3LL WH4T TH3 PR1C3 1S." Karkat tried to curse under his breath, but as he was not wearing the necklace, his annoyance was more than audible. He despised asking favors from her, but the only other mind player he knew of was her dead dancestor.

"FINE, I'LL GO LISTEN TO HIS FUCKING RANTING SOME MORE." Karkat walked off, shoulders slightly slumped. Terezi smirked.

* * *

"Did she actually do it right?" Karkat clasped the upgraded charm around his neck, checking with Kanaya to make sure Terezi had done her job. He hoped that Terezi would not fuck up his disguise given the significance of it, but he knew he couldn't afford to take any chances. Kanaya confirmed that Karkat's blood now smelled completely like that of a human. Sighing in relief, Karkat looked at his reflection, confirming that it indeed showed the human appearance it was before. He brushed his hand over his hair, feeling the still-unfamiliar sensation of a smooth, horn-free scalp: even the genesis frog was convinced. As contentious as his interactions with Terezi were, he had to admit that she was astonishingly good at her job. Thanking Kanaya, Karkat gave all his friends a quick goodbye (accompanied by a "fuck you" in Terezi's case) before returning to Jade and to the world of the Winchesters.


	3. A Caped Enigma

**A/N: Thanks to everyone who has read, reviewed, and et cetera! Here's another chapter! Sorry it's a bit on the short side. (And, once again, neither Homestuck nor Supernatural belong to me.)**

* * *

Karkat quickly looked down at his arm as he entered Harvelle's Roadhouse, reassured to see his human skin tone. Minutes after he sat down, occupying himself with a rather boring human newspaper, Sam and Dean walked in. Talking to Jo, Sam quickly walked off to see Ash, Dean taking a moment to apologize for his brother's rush before following suit. Karkat trailed behind them with some interest.

"Oh, hey. Kyle. Guess you got your… Thing… Done." Dean looked at Karkat, acknowledging him before turning towards Sam.

"Okay, I know this is going to sound weird, but I need you to run a search on a logo that looks a bit something like this." Sam passed Ash a napkin with an image of an emerging road on it, with "BLUERIDGE" printed beneath. Slightly confused, Ash complied, finding it to match the Blue Ridge bus lines in Guthrie, Oklahoma. Though Karkat had not spent much of any time looking into the Winchesters beyond this point in their timeline, he had investigated their current status enough to be almost certain that logo was from Sam's vision not long ago.

After an unsuccessful search for demonic signs in that area, Sam cleared his throat slightly, his next words a bit nervous. Both Dean and Karkat suspected that they would be dangerously specific words to say.

"All right. Try something else for me. Search Guthrie for a house fire. It would be 1983. Fire's origin would be a baby's nursery, night of the kid's six-month birthday." Hearing the request, Ash looked towards Sam with suspicion, but did as told when Sam offered him a beer for his work. As soon as Sam found a match for the search, he headed out to the Impala, beckoning Dean to come with. Karkat started to follow when Sam stopped him.

"Look, no offense, Kyle, we don't think you should come along to this hunt. It's kind of a family thing, and besides, it probably isn't the best for a relatively new hunter to come on. N-not that we think you're incompetent or anything." Karkat wanted to object, but instead retreated back to his seat, knowing they would not accept him along when it would risk "revealing" Sam's visions.

"Are you really going to just let them go without you?," Jo asked as soon as Sam and Dean had left the room.

"Of course not," Karkat replied, smirking.

As he walked out of the roadhouse half an hour later, he considered how he would manage to follow the Winchesters two states over. Flying was out of the question, unless he could make himself invisible, which he very clearly could not do. He did not have a car, nor could he drive one; besides, it would hardly be inconspicuous to un-captchalogue such a large object. He could ask Jade to send him over there, but despite the designation of his class, he was not fond of asking her for favors too often. That left the option of public transportation, which would be dangerous and expose him to more humans for an extended period of time, but was the best option nevertheless.

* * *

Karkat was sitting on a slightly-torn bus seat going through Kansas when a woman sat next to him. He moved to close his laptop when he spotted her face, working hard to stifle a gasp. He slowly reopened his laptop. At the same time, the woman next to him pulled out a handheld device with an image of a spider on the back.

carcinoGeneticist (CG) began trolling arachnidsGrip (AG)

CG: VRISKA, IS THAT YOU? WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING HERE?

AG: What, you think you're the only one who can join in on the fun? Terezi's the 8est, but w8ing around with everyone else there for nothing in particular can get a 8it 8oring. ::::)

CG: SO TEREZI MADE YOU ONE OF THESE FUCKING MIND CHARMS TOO? EVEN YOUR SPIDER EYE LOOKS LIKE A GOGDAMN HUMAN'S.

AG: I think you're underestim8ting my rel8tionship with her.

CG: STILL. WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO FUCKING *DO* IN THIS UNIVERSE?

AG: Have a little fun, o8viously. Aren't you fascin8ted by these… What were they… "Winchesters"?

CG: I FUCKING SWEAR, IF YOU REVEAL YOUR IDENTITY OR DO ANYTHING TO FUCK WITH THEM, I WILL MAKE SURE YOU DIE BY MY HANDS.

AG: I look forward to it. ::::)

CG: THEN I'M SURE YOU WON'T FUCKING MIND IF I TELL TEREZI AND THE OTHERS AS WELL, HUH? YOU'LL PROBABLY BE FUCKING THRILLED TO EXPLAIN YOUR WRONGDOINGS TO HER.

AG: …..

arachnidsGrip (AG) ceased pestering carcinoGeneticist (CG)

Vriska leaned back in her seat beside Karkat, her dirty blonde hair brushing the rough fabric. Karkat gawked slightly at her human appearance, having only just gotten used to his own. He turned back to his viewport. On the screen, Dean was in the Impala tailing a vehicle with rather peculiar decoration, though the inhabitant of it was most certainly human.

 _Wait,_ Karkat thought as he watched the man stop and exit his car, _that's a human, but… It's also slightly demonic._ He hadn't picked up on it before, but this man appeared to be both human and demon. It was similar to what Sam seemed like, but that was only because Sam had drunk the blood of a demon (a scene Karkat had watched many times over). Karkat looked earlier on his timeline, confirming Karkat's suspicion: named Andy, this man had gone through the same thing at the age of six months. Karkat switched the viewport back to the current point in time.

On the screen, Andy leaned towards the inside of the Impala where Dean sat. Dean exited the car, ushering Andy into the driver's seat, Dean remaining on the road where he was previously even as his beloved Impala drove out of his sight. Slightly confused, Karkat put on a pair of headphones, being careful that nobody could see him taking them out of his sylladex. He set the viewport back on the timeline by a minute, now watching with audio as Dean and Andy talked about the Impala.

"Hey. Could I have it?" When Andy spoke these words, they had a distorted and demonic tone, causing Karkat to take off his headphones and watch in slight horror as Dean handed Andy the keys and showed him into the truck.

"Hey," said Karkat in a hushed tone, getting Vriska's attention. "Watch this." As Karkat handed Vriska his headphones and set the viewport slightly back in time once again, Vriska's reaction confirmed his suspicion: this was definitely mind control.

Not wanting to speak aloud when others could overhear, Karkat took back his computer, opening Trollian.

carcinoGeneticist (CG) began trolling arachnidsGrip (AG)

CG: THIS THAT WHAT I FUCKING THINK IT IS?

AG: Assuming that you think it is mind control, I 8elieve you are correct.

CG: SO IS THAT ASSHOLE LIKE YOU OR NOT?

AG: No, his a8ilities seem nothing like mine. He also pro8a8ly wasn't 8orn with them, m8king the a8ilities weaker.

CG: WELL, THAT'S FUCKING GREAT. WHAT THE FUCK ARE WE SUPPOSED TO DO WITH HIM?

AG: What, you don't intend to w8t and see what these "Winchesters" do?

CG: NOT IF THIS GUY FUCKING KILLS THEM!

AG: Awwwwwwww, how sweet. Nu88y-horns over here c8res about these new-universe humans.

CG: SHUT THE FUCK UP.

AG: I must say, I'm developing a 8it of a soft spot for them myself. ::::)

CG: WHATEVER THE FUCK YOU SAY, JUST DON'T HARM THEM.

carcinoGeneticist (CG) ceased trolling arachnidsGrip (AG)

Karkat sighed slightly, setting his viewport back to the current point on the timeline, seeing that Sam and Dean had made the same conjecture about Andy. This would be a long trip.

A number of train and bus rides later, Karkat arrived in Guthrie, Oklahoma. Vriska continued to accompany him, much to his agitation. Normally, Karkat would avoid making his presence known to the Winchesters as a means to prevent suspicion, but he knew he could not simply stay out of the matter: the Winchesters were in danger. However, in a flash of inspiration, he uncatalogued a cloak identical to that of the Signless- he had long since forgotten why it was even in his sylladex- and put it on. Even if the disguise wasn't perfect, it would make his identity less likely to be revealed. Seeing Karkat do this, Vriska made a move to change her attire similarly, but Karkat stopped her. Vriska's presence would be dangerous enough even without some flashy and much less effective wardrobe.

* * *

"You twisted son of a bitch!" Andy's voice rang out as he grabbed his twin, Webber, by the collar. This man had killed Andy's friends and family with the same mind control powers Andy had, and was attempting to do the same to his girlfriend Tracy.

"Back off, Andy! Or Tracy is gonna do a little flying." Hearing his twin say this, Andy turned around in horror to see his girlfriend turn towards the nearby cliff.

"Tracy, no!" Andy's cry echoed through the dark night air as Tracy jumped off the cliff, plummeting towards the bottom.

Suddenly, with the flapping of light gray fabric, a figure swooped through the air, pulling Tracy back up to the top of the cliff she had just dived off of. Everyone at the scene watched with amazement, including Sam on the rough pavement and Dean from between two scraggly bushes a safe distance away. As the cloaked figure rose through the air with Tracy in its arms and swiftly absconded, Sam could have sworn he caught sight of a man's irises flickering from green to candy-red.

As soon as Tracy was safely atop the cliff, she felt her legs moving almost of their own accord, backing away from the edge. At the same time, Webber shakily stepped off the cliff himself, making a cringe-inducing sound as he hit the bottom seconds later.

From the shadows, Karkat swore under his breath at Vriska for taking the excessive measure. Gesturing at her to come along, Karkat fled the scene.

* * *

Sitting in the Impala on the way to Harvelle's Roadhouse, Sam and Dean were both taken aback by what they had witnessed that night.

"Seriously… what the hell was that?" Dean had asked the question at least twenty times in the past few hours, and Sam was no less curious, having mentioned the red eyes to accelerate Dean's bewilderment even further. Neither knew where to start; between the flying man that saved Andy's girlfriend and the fact that Webber appeared to be mind controlled even when he possessed powers himself, the Winchesters only agreed with certainty about one thing: a supernatural creature was present that night, and they might have to hunt it down.

When Sam and Dean arrived back at the roadhouse, they spotted Karkat arguing with a girl wearing blue lipstick and a shirt bearing the scorpio astrological symbol. When Dean walked up to them, Karkat gestured at the girl to shut up, then turned to Dean.

"I know you probably don't fucking mind, but I'm going to hang back for a while. You continue going on your fucking hunts, I just have something to deal with." Sam quickly noted the familiarity of Karkat's green-appearing eyes, but quickly dismissed his suspicion- after all, plenty of people have green eyes.

"You sure seem to have a lot of personal business lately, but okay. See you later, Kyle." In Dean's mind, this was for the best- with all the things going on, he didn't need to have a man that was still essentially a stranger hanging around. Bidding Sam and Dean a farewell, Karkat gave Vriska a meaningful look, causing her to follow him as he rounded the corner of the roadhouse until he was sure they were out of sight.

"You've had your fun, so why the fuck are you still hanging around?" Karkat's voice was somewhat hushed, wary of anyone listening in.

"I already told you, same reason as you are."

"Well, I don't want you to fuck shit up, so I'm not letting you roam around this fucking universe."

"What gives you the right to control who is and isn't down here?" Vriska's voice raised as she said this, causing Karkat to look around cautiously. Hushing her slightly, Karkat uncatalogued his crab walkie-talkie, messaging Jade with a request to send both him and Vriska back before Vriska could stop him.

Finding themselves in front of Jade, Karkat and Vriska moved apart, each taking off their necklaces. Jade looked at them with some reproach: both knew she cared very much about keeping their identities hidden to that universe. Thankfully, though, she didn't seem to mind sending people around space when they requested it.

After an extensive argument that resulted in Vriska grudgingly agreeing to temporarily stay away from the other universe, Karkat sighed heavily and flopped down on a couch next to Dave.

"sup bro," Dave greeted Karkat, making room for Karkat beside him and the Mayor.

"I'M SO FUCKING GLAD TO SEE YOU. IT'S NICE TO NOT HAVE TO HIDE MY IDENTITY AROUND THOSE NEW-UNIVERSE FUCKERS ALL THE TIME."

"nice to see you too, you planning to go back down there?"

"I THINK I'LL STAY HERE A WHILE. AT LEAST UNTIL THOSE FUCKASSES NEED ME OR SOME SHIT." At this, Dave nodded, he and Karkat continuing to make small talk as they watched the purple crab-like television in front of them.


	4. Ghosts and Shifters

**A/N: Sorry for the wait. Anyways, neither Supernatural nor Homestuck belong to me.**

* * *

"It's a job. I mean, a lady drowned in the bathtub, then a few days ago, a guy falls down the stairs, head turns a complete 180. Which isn't exactly normal, you know? Look, I don't know, Dean- it might be nothing, but I told Ellen we'd think about checking it out." Ellen had proposed the job idea to Sam, who was trying to convince Dean to go along with it.

"You did?"

"Yeah." As Sam said this, Dean's phone began to ring.

"Hold on," said Dean, answering the call. "Hello?"

"Oh, hi, Kyle. You were gone for a while. Yeah, no, just a couple things. If you want to meet up and keep hunting, we'll probably be taking a case at Pierpont Inn in Cornwall, Conneticut." With this, Dean looked over at Sam and nodded. "Yup, see you there."

"I guess we're going, then," said Dean as he hung up the phone.

Later, after Sam and Dean had investigated a bit and another man died, Dean walked downstairs to the hotel's bar. As he walked up to the counter, he spotted Karkat sitting on one of the stools, talking to the old man tending the bar.

"Sorry to interrupt your little chat." Dean sat down beside Kyle, greeting him and the man, the latter of whom had quite a history with the hotel.

"Oh, it's no big deal," the man said. "I was just telling him some stories about this old place. If you'd like, you can listen in." Dean agreed to this, sipping a beer as the man continued to talk about the hotel's history. In his storytelling, the man showed a picture of Rose, the old grandmother of the family owning the hotel, with her old nanny. Both Dean and Karkat took note of the hoodoo symbol on the nanny's necklace. It was clear that Rose, who was now immobile in a chair, had known hoodoo. When the man had told stories and shown off some more historical artifacts from the hotel, Karkat thanked him and went off with Dean back to the room where a drunk Sam was throwing up in the toilet. Dean and Sam headed off to talk to Rose, but Karkat decided not to go along, saying he had something else he needed to check.

"Your turn. Eightsies." A young girl with straight blond hair was playing a game with another girl, her hair curled but otherwise similar in appearance. However, as she heard Karkat's footsteps, the girl turned around, looking at Karkat. Karkat looked back at her- a ghost.

"Mister, why are you looking at Maggie like that?" The living girl, Tyler, asked the question with some surprise: every other adult had not seen Maggie, had pretended she did not exist. As Maggie looked up at Karkat, she smirked slightly.

"It's alright, I'm not going to hurt you. What game are you playing?" Karkat crouched down by the two girls, him and Maggie both trying to hide the fact that they were watching each other.

"I don't like you. Go away." When Maggie said the words, Karkat backed off a bit and complied; he already had all the confirmation he needed, and now was not the time to raise an unnecessary ruckus.

* * *

"Oh my god. Tyler! Tyler!" The girl's mother was shouting in search of her daughter, causing Karkat to run in the room.

"What? Is she missing?" Karkat's question was filled with panic.

"She's not here!" Tyler's mother's tone bordered on hysterical.

"Susan, tell us what you know about Maggie. Did you ever know anybody by that name? Think, think- somebody that could have lived here, might have passed away." As Sam asked the question, Tyler's mother was panicking.

"My god," she responded, "my mom had a sister named Margaret. She drowned in the pool."

"Fuck," Karkat muttered, running off with Sam and Dean behind him.

Karkat ran up to the door outside of the pool where Tyler and Maggie were standing on the edge facing off a railing the floor above. Crying out for Tyler, everybody tried to smash through the door, but to no avail.

"Take the fucking back door!" Karkat urged Sam, Dean, and Tyler's mom away, uncaptchaloguing his pure iron sickle as soon as he saw all three of them turn the corner. Karkat smashed open the door and ran up to where Tyler and Maggie were standing. He swung his sickle at Maggie, but it was too late- she had already pushed Tyler off. With no time to think, Karkat recaptchalogued his sickle, diving down to Tyler in time to catch her fall. Swimming through the plastic-covered water, Karkat carried Tyler to the side of the pool.

Meanwhile, behind the corner of a beige brick wall, Sam watched, covering his mouth so he would not gasp. He and Dean had been a bit suspicious of Karkat considering Karkat's actions in the past, and his suspicions had just increased tenfold.

Tyler lay beside the pool, breathing heavily. Karkat turned his head towards the back door, then quickly turned back to Tyler, whispering in her ear.

"Don't tell anyone what you just saw me do, okay?" Tyler nodded, still shaken up from almost dying. Karkat could not ensure cooperation through blood powers without some sort of agreement or bond- but now he had one, and he made sure that Tyler would never speak of his rescuing her as long as that universe kept existing.

At that moment, Dean ran up to Tyler with Tyler's mother, frantically checking that the small girl was okay. Dean thanked Karkat- he did not know what lengths Karkat went to in ensuring Tyler's safety, though he would soon enough.

Dean, Sam, and Karkat were rather quick to leave the case, now that it seemed to be taken care of. As Karkat entered the back seat of the Impala, neither Sam nor Dean made any move to stop him- not yet. The next few hours were spent driving in silence.

* * *

"but really whats wwrong wwith that because i didnt evven say somethin mean she just kinda wwent awway"

"MAYBE THAT'S THE FUCKING PROBLEM- HOLD ON, I THINK I'M WAKING UP." With this, Karkat disappeared, leaving Eridan alone with his problems in the dream bubbles.

Karkat's eyes opened sluggishly, observing a room with dark stone walls. His hands and feet were bound with rope. _I've done it,_ Karkat thought. _This is it. I fucked up._ He looked down at his neck, grateful that his necklace was still on and his flesh was still human.

Sam and Dean walked into the room. Dean leaned in close to Karkat, speaking in a stable tone.

"Kyle… Sorry to bind you up and all, cautionary measures, but," Dean looked straight into Karkat's eyes, "what the hell did you do back there?"

"Excuse me?" Karkat responded with feigned confusion, not knowing how much the Winchesters had seen.

"I was watching you, you know," Sam piped in. "I saw you when you saved that girl. I saw you pull a weapon out of thin air." Karkat sighed internally, but was careful that the expression did not make it to his face.

"So you fucking TIED ME UP?" Karkat's voice raised, sounding almost normal for him.

"All we want is for you to tell us… Once we know what's going on, we'll make our next decision accordingly." Dean spoke with determination.

"I just…" Karkat tried to calm himself down. "I'm human, believe me. It's just, ever since a year ago, I have this… ability." Karkat felt a bit bad about lying, but he knew this was the best option.

"What?" At this, Sam raised his eyebrows, his expression changing. Dean backed off from Karkat a bit, exchanging a look with Sam.

"I'm able to store things in this sort of other dimension, and take them out when I need them. But I swear, I'm a human just like you." Hearing this, Sam walked towards Karkat, kneeling down to the height of the chair.

"Then that means… You're one of us." Hearing Sam say this, Karkat feigned confusion.

"Me and these other people, we… This yellow-eyed demon Dean and I have been hunting, it did something, and all these people like me have psychic powers. I have visions."

"Well then." Karkat gulped. "I don't suppose I still need to be tied up here, do I?" Karkat captchalogued the rope around his wrists, making it disappear. After untying his ankles and standing up, Karkat took the rope back out of his sylladex, tossing it across the room. Dean watched with slight awe.

"So if you're done interrogating me, are we ready to go fight some evil fuckers?" Karkat smiled slightly. He had their trust now- he just hoped he could keep it that way.

* * *

"So here we've got Milwaukee National Trust- it was hit about a month ago. Juan Morales: inside job, longtime employee, the 'never in a million years' type. Dude robs the bank, then goes home and supposedly commits suicide. This guy Resnick was the security guard on duty. He was actually beaten unconscious by the teller who heisted the place. And now the same sort of thing happened with this jewelry store." As Sam finished saying this, he knocked on the door of the house they were walking up to.

"Mr Resnick! Ronald Resnick. We're the FBI. We need to follow up on your statement." As Sam said this, the three hunters held up their identification badges. Ronald, the man inside, appeared satisfied with the proof after a few seconds of hesitation.

"Wait- you read my statement? Come to listen to what I got to say?" Somewhat doubting Dean's affirmative answer to both questions, Ronald let the three of them in, leading them to a room with conspiracy theories pinned up all over the wall.

"First off, Juan Morales never robbed the Milwaukee National Trust. That I guarantee. See, me and Juan were friends. He used to come back to the bank on my night shifts, and we'd play cards. I let this thing into the bank… but it wasn't Juan. I mean, it had his face, but it wasn't _his_ face. Every detail was perfect, but too perfect, you know, like if a doll maker made it, like I was talking to a big Juan doll. Look, this wasn't the only time this happened." Ronald handed Karkat a folder with files inside. "There was this jewelry store, too, and the cops and you guys, you just won't see it. Both crimes were pulled by the same thing." As Ronald spoke, Karkat leafed through the folder, its contents investigating the same case the three hunters were looking into. Karkat had to admit that it was rather good case work.

"And what would this _thing_ be, Mr. Resnick?," asked Karkat. At this, Ronald bent down, picking up a magazine with a cyberman from a popular TV show on the cover.

"Chinese been working on them for years, and the Russians before that- part man, part machine, like the Terminator, but the kind that can change itself, make itself look like other people. So not just a robot, more of a- a man-droid." Karkat held back a snicker at the name; people had made incorrect assumptions about the supernatural before, but this man's misinterpretation bordered on absurd.

"What makes you so sure about this, Ronald?" In response to Dean's question, Ronald inserted a VHS tape into a player, showing them the footage.

"I made copies of all the security tapes. I knew once the cops got them, they'd be buried. Now watch." Ronald sped through the footage, stopping it as it showed a man walking through the hallway. The man's eyes flared at the camera the way a shapeshifter would- or, in Ronald's interpretation, a robot. At this, Karkat stood up, Sam and Dean following suit. After Sam took the time to tell Ronald that he was wrong and take the copied security footage, the three of them left.

"Shapeshifter." Back at their hotel room, Sam was looking through the tapes they confiscated, confirming what they were all rather certain of: this was the thing they were hunting. Behind Sam, Dean and Karkat were sitting at a round coffee table, lining up a map with the sewer line that Ronald correctly assumed the shapeshifter was living in.

"I hate those freaking things," Dean commented.

"Well, to be fair, I think we all fucking do." Karkat's response was met with a slight smirk from Dean.

"Yeah, but neither of you were framed for murder by one of them." Karkat shrugged; Dean was right about that. Dean looked back down at the map.

"Ronald's right. All the robberies have been connected by the main sewer line, and if it's anything like the last shapeshifter we faced, it's going to be living down there." Dean paused, allowing Karkat to complete his thought.

"There's another fucking bank lined up along that sewer main."

* * *

Sam, Dean, and Karkat were dressed in navy blue security guard uniforms as the three of them sat down in front of the security cameras monitoring the City Bank of Milwaukee. After about ten minutes of watching the footage, Sam voiced the concern that the shapeshifter might not even be there, but was cut off by Karkat.

"Wait. Zoom in on that guy." Dean switched the controls to view a man in a suit: a man with eyes that flashed white at the camera. Sam and Karkat got up to go follow the guy when Dean stopped them, noticing something.

"I think we've got a bit of a problem here." On one of the screens, Ronald was shown locking the door leading outside the bank. Seconds later, they heard shots fired.

Sam, Dean, and Karkat walked into the main room of the bank, seeing Ronald holding a key in one hand and a gun in another as everyone else present sat in the center of the room.

"Hey, buddy," Dean said as the three of them walked into the room. "Why don't you calm down? Just calm down."

"What? You guys!" Ronald let out an accusatory scowl as his attention turned to the three of them. "Get on the floor now!" They followed the instruction.

"I knew it- as soon as you left. You three ain't FBI. Who are you?" Ronald paused. "Who are you working for, huh? The men in black? You working for the man-droid?"

"We're not working for any fucking man-droid!" Karkat's demand mad Ronald stop and gesture a couple people on the floor over to where the three of them were.

"Frisk them down, make sure they got no weapons. Go!" Karkat looked over at Dean, both of them resisting the urge to smile. Dean had recommended that Karkat captchalogue a silver knife before they left, and though it was not Karkat's weapon of choice, he was now thankful for the advice. No weapons were found on any of them.

"Stop waving that gogdamn cannon around or someone is going to get hurt!" Karkat's request was not met.

"Now," Sam interjected, "why don't you let these people go?"

"Shut up! I'm not talking to you! I don't like you!" Ronald yelled this, causing Sam to sigh; he was right: Sam had been rather harsh to Ronald earlier.

"I already told you! If nobody's going to stop this thing, then I've got to do it myself!" Ronald was shouting this, but Dean cut him off.

"We believe you! That's why we're here."

"You don't believe me! Nobody believes me! How could they?" Ronald's expression was almost a broken one. Dean beckoned Ronald to come closer, and Ronald reluctantly agreed.

"It's the bank manager. Why do you think we've got these getups, huh? We've been monitoring the cameras in the back. We saw the bank manager. We saw his eyes. We've got to find him before he changes into someone else." Dean's whisper brought a look to Ronald's face that was somewhere between terror and excitement. Still, Ronald did not believe Dean's words.

"I'll shoot you! Get down!" Dean stood up slowly as Ronald continued his yelling. Not sure whether to follow suit or not, Karkat stayed down.

"Take me, okay? Take me as a hostage. But we got to act fast because the longer we just sit here, the more time he has to change. Look at me, man. I believe you. You're not crazy. There really is something inside this bank." Hearing Dean's words, Ronald looked around nervously, then shouted an instruction for everybody else in the room to enter a vault.

In the vault, Karkat made himself listen to a woman going on about her admiration for Dean- he desperately wanted to take out his computer and open the viewport, but only Sam knew about his sylladex, and Karkat did not want to risk even Sam discovering that he had a universal way to spy on this universe; he had done enough explaining recently. However, after not too long, the room went dark, backup generators then illuminating the space with fluorescent light. Karkat cursed, both him and Sam knowing that trouble was now here: the cops had shown up and cut the power lines. Minutes later, Dean opened the vault door, rushing more people into the room. Karkat watched the procession of people entering, growing alert as he saw a particular man walk in- a shifter. Dean called out Sam and Karkat.

"I think I should keep an eye on the people in here. You never know- the shifter could be one of them." Karkat was careful not to reveal that he knew exactly who and where this shifter was.

"Yeah, but even if it is one of them, it's not going to attack in such a crowded room while everybody is watching. Come on." Hearing Dean's response, Karkat reluctantly left the vault, hoping Dean was right. Across the room, a phone rang, and Ronald answered.

"Hello? What do you mean, demands?" Karkat ran up to Ronald, forcing him to hang up the phone. The less the cops knew, the better: Karkat could not afford to draw any legal attention, and for some of the same reasons, neither could Sam or Dean. Across the room, Sam was dealing with a man who appeared to be having a heart attack. He was not sure what to do, fearing that the man might be the shifter (which Karkat dared not inform him otherwise of). However, Sam decided to risk that, picking up the phone and calling the police back.

"Look, one of the people in here could be having heart trouble. You need to send in a paramedic. Just send in a paramedic, okay?! Don't try anything else! Please." Sam hung up. From a couple rooms over, a crashing sound was heard- Dean had discovered the body of the man the shapeshifter had taken the form of.

"Come on, man, you've got to unlock the front door. We've got to get him out of here." This man- the shapeshifter- was begging that the man with the heart attack be let out. Dean ran up to Sam and Karkat, quietly informing them of the shapeshifter's identity. Sam walked up to the injured man, beginning to take him outside, when the shifter offered to help.

"No fucking way," Karkat retaliated. "We're not letting anyone else out." As Sam led the injured man away, Dean and Karkat looked at the shifter before Dean walked up to him, asking to talk. The man agreed, but as soon as he'd left the vault, he knocked Dean over, running to do the same to Karkat. Karkat began to pull his blade out of his sylladex but hesitated, knowing that everyone in the still-open vault could see. Karkat was knocked down by the shifter, who ran out and into the hallway. He quickly got back up, chasing the shifter with Dean. Ronald followed suit, running through the light shed by a window. In less than a second, a bullet went through him, causing the man to fall onto the floor. The three hunters watched for a few seconds in stunned silence before Sam and Karkat ran after the shifter once again, leaving Dean to deal with the security guard who shot Ronald through the window.

Sam knocked open a door with blood outside it, and a woman fell out, her throat slit. Karkat ran up, resisting the urge to stab her right then- it was a shifter, and it was very alive, but he could not simply let Sam know. The woman looked like Sheri, the same person who had been praising Dean earlier. Sam ran off to Dean by the vault, opening it and coaxing Sheri out of it.

"Oh, god!" Sheri jumped in fright at the sight of her double with its throat slit and covered in blood. Karkat had stayed back to watch it- the pretend corpse had not made a move yet. Sam and Dean taunted Sheri, thinking she was the shifter, when she fainted. Sam and Dean stood there in puzzlement, wondering why a shifter would have fainted in that situation. Karkat tried to remain neutral as he watched Dean walk up to Sheri with his knife, but yelled out just as Dean was about to plunge the blade in its heart.

"WAIT!" Karkat kneeled down, looking at the shifter as it feigned death. At that moment, the shifter reached up and grabbed his neck. It would have rendered him incapable, but it did not expect Karkat to pull a silver blade out of what seemed to be thin air and stab it. Eyes widening, the shifter's arms fell limp in death. Seconds later, cops burst into the building, looking for Sam and Dean, the latter of whom had been caught on live television. The police had caught on to them.

Minutes later and a safe distance away in the Impala, the three hunters took off heavy black police helmets. Only two words were uttered, and they came out of Karkat's mouth.

"We're fucked."

* * *

 **A/N: This was originally supposed to be two different chapters, but I combined them because they were too short. ...Yeah, this was a bitch to write, so sorry about any mistakes or awkward phrasing. Anyways, feel free to leave a review. *Absconds***


	5. Collapse

**A/N: *Hesitantly swipes of metric tonne of dust from abandoned computer* Oh... Oh no...**

When Sam suggested the case, he, Dean, and Karkat were only expecting a regular haunting. A college professor had taken a swan dive off a balcony, fitting in perfectly with the local myth of a haunting in the building. An interview with some students on the campus revealed that; however, some believed it only to be an urban legend. The three hunters were quick to continue their case at the crime scene, posing as representatives from an electrical company.

"Hey, can I help you guys?" a passing janitor inquired as Sam, Dean, and Karkat entered the building. When the janitor entered Karkat's field of vision, Karkat groaned a bit, clutching his skull and stumbling back.

"My fucking thinkpan…" Karkat tried to keep his voice low, but he could not disguise the pained grunt he let out. His thoughts swirled about, and he could feel the contents of his stomach threatening to escape. What stood in front of him was unlike anything he had ever laid eyes on before.

The creature appeared around a thousand feet tall, yet simultaneously reduced to fit the form of a human vessel. It had numerous pairs of wings that Karkat did not bother to count, along with a multitude of faces resembling those of various creatures. Aside from that, the creature was cloaked in a light of brightness comparable to the Alternian sun, though Karkat's eyes adjusted to the sight before he could end up needing- _smelling lessons_ -from Terezi.

"Hey, Kyle, are you okay?" Dean asked as he saw Karkat wince. Karkat quickly regained his composure, adjusting to the sight of _gog-knows-what_.

"Yeah," Karkat said in as stable of a voice as he could manage. "I'm fucking fine. Just had something of a headache. It's nothing."

"Anyways, yeah," said Sam, turning to the janitor. "We're just here to do a routine check up on some of the wiring. We'll stay out of your hair."

"Well, just let me know if you boys need anything," the janitor said with a look of slight puzzlement on his face, a look he was clearly not accustomed to having. Sam and Dean proceeded towards the professor's office.

"Hold on, I'm going to get something." Karkat dismissed Sam and Dean, who left after a negotiable bit of not-so-subtle hand waves. As soon as Sam and Dean were out of sight, Karkat turned towards the janitor.

"May I talk to you alone for a minute?" Hearing this, the janitor led Karkat to a room that was something between an office and a storage closet.

"What the fuck are you?" Karkat was almost growling as he asked the question. The man put his hands up, his face warped with shock.

"Listen, buddy, I- I'm just the janitor here."

"No you aren't."

At this, the janitor put his hands back down, mouth turning up at the corner.

"Then I suppose I could ask you the same thing." Hearing the janitor say this, Karkat's eyebrows raised a bit. If Terezi's charm was strong enough to convince the Genesis frog and render Karkat's horns nigh-insubstantial, then he thought it could not be seen through by any creature of this universe.

"What the fuck do you know?" Karkat shot back.

"Not much," the janitor admitted, laughing. His face then grew serious. "Everything about you is… _unnervingly_ human. But your whole past, your mind, is a mystery."

Karkat sighed, uncertain of whether to be relieved or wary.

"Now, as I asked: what are you?"

"A trickster."

Karkat's eyes narrowed to slivers in suspicion. Before he realized what was happening, Karkat felt his neck snap back with a sharp force.

* * *

In other circumstances, Karkat could have been considerably less lucky. Had his death been less meaningful, a limp corpse would have decorated the polished floor as some form of macabre rug.

However, this is not that story. A kaleidoscope of color seemed to be pulled from the room itself, lights weaving around each other and dancing to an unheard symphony. The visual cacophony swelled until the only thing visible within that cramped closet was the hovering body blanketed in this light. It took mere seconds for the strands to unravel, returning to their places to reveal an intact figure with notably gray skin.

"FUCK."

Feeling his predicament more than seeing it through the receding haze, Karkat lowered his body to the ground and frantically began rooting around for his pendant. It was in this process that Karkat realized, in addition to his reverted anatomy, the deep crimson pajamas that covered his form once more. If kissing his disguise goodbye as it promptly buried itself in a hypothetical dump of bullshit wasn't enough of a goddamn hassle to last Karkat for weeks, then the sound of footsteps emerging behind him certainly was.

"SHIT...UM…"

Karkat mentally called out to his [lunar] fetch modus, one he used primarily because of its convenience in the majority of situations. This was, of course, at the cost of a guarantee that it would royally fuck everything up once a month, typically at the most inopportune of times. A part of Karkat took a second to laugh hollowly at how accurately his circumstance fit the criterion.

A deep purple husktop with six mechanical legs launched itself through the air, blowing a toddler-sized hole in the closet door. The machine emanated a faint squealing sound as it collided with something in the distance- Karkat didn't bother to check what it was.

"...JUST EVISCERATED A GODDAMN HIGHBLOOD AND FED THE ENTRAILS TO A SWARM OF CLACKBEASTS IN FRONT OF THE FUCKING EMPRESS TO PROVE A POINT AND… DROWN IN A TUB FILLED WITH ITS OWN VILE EXCRETION… MAKE A COLOSSAL EARTHQUAKE WITH ALL THE DAMN FORCE OF YOUR PALM AND FACE CLASHING…"

Between fits of cursing under his breath- to whatever extent he could at his current volume- Karkat wracked his brain for a way out of the situation. Here he was, stuck in a confined space on Earth and about to be discovered with his amulet nowhere to be found. On top of that, he couldn't contact anyone with his escaped computer, and his sylladex seemed to have locked itself up. Fan-fucking-tastic.

"Kyle?"

Freezing up, Karkat reluctantly turned his head to face the closet door. Candy-red irises met opposing green ones for perhaps a second before rolling back as Karkat collapsed to the floor.

 **A/N: Yes, it's short. Yes, it's kind of a cop-out. Yes, I'm ashamed. I have no excuses. Hopefully I'll at least be able to continue the story now, though.**


	6. Hell Considers Breaking Loose

**(A/N: Thanks to everyone who reviewed- I'm not sure I could find the motivation to continue this without you. I feel bad about falling back on this considerably shorter chapter, but I am currently the embodiment of writer's block and I don't want to leave you hanging forever. ^^;;)**

Karkat bit his lower lip in an attempt to stave off the dull headache muddling his consciousness. The sharp, fang-like teeth pressed down a bit too hard, causing beads of candy-red substance to well up around Karkat's mouth. Something about the circumstance seemed alarming to Karkat, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. Headache… blood… sharp…

Karkat's eyelids snapped open with an unusual intensity, allowing him to take in the gray stone ceiling overhead. His teeth weren't supposed to be like that- not here. Where was he, anyways? Karkat attempted to sit up, only to feel restraints tying him down to the table.

"I guess that gear was enough, huh? Good," Dean Winchester's voice intoned. A twinge of some emotion, perhaps betrayal, stung at Karkat. "The table seems to be working well enough on its own, I wonder if all that rune carving was worth it."

"WHAT THE EVER-LIVING FUCK ARE YOU GOING ON ABOUT?"

"I'm talking about all that damn effort we went to restrain you, to restrain someone we thought was our friend," Dean continued, anger escalating in his voice. "How do you think it feels to find out your hunting partner, someone your entire life could depend on, is some creature that could very well be spying on you? After taking suspicious absences and hiding your online conversations behind our backs, do you just expect me to let some unidentifiable monster roam freely around my brother?"

"I'M NOT A GOGDAMN MONSTER! WHERE IS SAMMY, ANYWAYS?" Karkat shouted no sooner than he felt a knuckle connect with the rough skin of his cheek.

"Sam wanted me to be gentle to you, Kyle, but a monster like you doesn't deserve to call him that." Dean's voice had faded to a deadly calm, matching the cold expression Karkat saw in his face, which was now leaning over Karkat's own. Bright red eyes gazed into furious green ones and Karkat felt his pulse adjust to Dean's own as he sent out a mental command.

 _Trust me._ It wasn't mind control- Karkat's aspect was more subtle than that- but Karkat still felt a degree of surprise when Dean's attitude towards him remained unchanged. Karkat realized why that was when he felt a stronger connection within Dean: one to his brother.

Karkat's expression faltered from annoyance to something Dean couldn't interpret. Sure, Karkat could supercharge his own relationship with Dean or reduce the kinship between the Winchester brothers, but it didn't sit right with him to override something so important to them. When Karkat spoke again, it was uncharacteristically quiet.

"...Okay. Do whatever you want. I can wait." Honestly, Karkat wasn't sure what he could do on this new Earth even if he did escape, considering that his hunting companions distrusted him now. _None of my other friends seem to be paying attention, so I might as well just sit on this table for however long it takes for my thinkpan to begin seeping out of orifices from sheer boredom_ , Karkat reflected glumly.

Karkat did end up sitting through occasional attempts on the Winchesters' part to kill him permanently, though Sam seemed conspicuously absent for the greater part of them. Funnily, Dean seemed to be angry at Karkat for Sam's sake, even though Sam himself seemed more sympathetic for some reason. That was the only material Karkat had to think about for weeks on end.

* * *

Karkat was staring at the ceiling through half-lidded eyes when the sound of a door smashing shook him from his reverie.

"DEAN, IS IT YOU AGAIN? IT'S ABOUT FUCKING TIME YOU SHOWED UP. IT'S BEEN PRETTY BORING DROWNING IN A CESSPOOL OF MY OWN SELF-HATRED HERE." Karkat's shouting was followed up by a rough shaking from Dean, whose response was just as loud as Karkat's speech.

"WAS IT YOU, YOU LITTLE BITCH? WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH MY BROTHER?!"

"HOLD ON, WHAT THE BULGE-LICKING FUCK ARE YOU EVEN SPEWING OUT OF YOUR PROTEIN CHUTE? DID SOMETHING HAPPEN TO SAM?" Panic was sown through Karkat's words, remnants of the friendship he held with the Winchesters.

"HE DISAPPEARED! IS IT YOUR FAULT OR NOT?!"

"FOR THE LAST TIME, I'M NOT YOUR GOGDAMNED ENEMY! DON'T ASK ME!"

"I guess it's that yellow-eyed asshole then." Dean seemed to calm down, panting in the aftermath of his outburst.

"WAIT, IS HE OKAY?!" Karkat captchalogued the chains holding him down before discarding them to the side. Huh, at least that was working again. _I really should switch to a modus that_ isn't _from a doom player once I've got my shit together._

Seeing Karkat's escape, Dean pulled a gun from his belt and held it forward. Karkat chose to ignore the threat.

"SERIOUSLY, WHERE THE FUCK IS HE?"

"If I knew, do you think I'd be asking you?!"

"FAIR ENOUGH." Karkat dashed out of the room and escaped the vicinity in spite of Dean's efforts to chase him down.

* * *

Once he was a fair distance from Dean, Karkat reflected that fleeing might not have been a good idea- Dean really was his only lead to finding out what happened to Sam but _dammit_ , that room was suffocating. Karkat would be more than happy to mash his own skull repeatedly into a nondescript wall as punishment for not thinking to captchalogue the room's chains earlier, except for the fact that doing such a thing would be incredibly counterproductive. He settled for a firm facepalm instead.

 _I GUESS I COULD GET SOMEONE ELSE'S HELP TO FIND HIM?_ Nope. Aside from the myriad of issues that could come from involving someone else with the supernatural, Karkat wasn't exactly presentable to anyone on this gogforsaken planet.

 _CATCH UP TO DEAN AND WORK WITH HIM?_ Karkat didn't get the feeling that Dean would be cooperative at the moment.

 _UM… MERGE WITH SOME FUCKER'S BLOOD AND PIGGYBACK THEM TO WHERE DEAN IS?_

…

What is he, an _heir?_

Nearing his wit's end, Karkat resigned himself to trailing the elder Winchester at a safe distance. After all, he just had to worry about not being seen and then Karkat could see what was wrong with Sam once Dean found out.

* * *

Following someone while remaining completely unseen was considerably more difficult than Karkat estimated. Still, it paid off when Karkat caught news of Dean finding a lead on Sam's location.

It seemed that all hell was going to break loose.


End file.
